Spring training numbers need to be taken with a grain of salt, but there’s no denying that Ryan McMahon has been a monster in the month of March. In 59 Cactus League at bats, the Colorado Rockies infielder banged out 25 hits while slashing a behemothic .424/.470/.763. His 1.233 OPS led the leaderboards in Arizona and Florida alike.
No, he isn’t about to approach those numbers in games that count — this isn’t Ty Cobb we’re talking about — but the 24-year-old is being counted on to provide value to the Rockies lineup. Three games into the regular season, he’s done just that. McMahon has four hits, including a pair of doubles, plus two walks, in a dozen plate appearances. Lilliputian sample size? Sure, but it’s nonetheless a nice start for the 2013 second-round pick.
His 2018 rookie season was a disappointment. In 202 big-league PAS, he fanned 64 times, and logged a .683 OPS. That came on the heels of spring training numbers which, while not as heady as this year’s, suggested he was ready to rake at the highest level. Instead, he scuffled.
McMahon is self-aware enough not to have forgotten last year. Asked a few weeks ago about his scorching spring, he reminded reporters that it had only been a few dozen at bats — spring training at bats, no less — and that “Baseball is a very humbling game. You never have it all the way figured out.” Read the rest of this entry »
Sure, he’s won seven straight batting titles in Japan, but it’s telling that, in English, “Ichiro Suzuki” roughly translates to “Can’t hit Pedro.”
– The Utah Chronicle, March 30th, 2001
It is late afternoon in Seattle, and it is the beginning of April, and it is quite cold. The Mariners are going to play the Oakland A’s. Today, the baseball starts counting. Across the infield dirt, just behind second base, a few faint letters mark the time: 2001.
More than 45,000 people are here, the most that have ever crowded into this still-new stadium. There’s less team spirit on display than you might expect. Most of the attendees aren’t flaunting jerseys; they’re bundled up, hands tucked into coats. The fading sunlight falls over the stadium from behind the pale, high clouds, and as a few Mariners take the field, running sprints across the outfield grass, a hearty cheer rises up to greet them. The men in white stretch, pulling arms and bouncing in lunges, before trotting back to the dugout. Not much longer, now. Not much longer.
High up on a view level fence, in front of a kid and their dad, you can see a white posterboard, letters painted in amateurish block text: “WELCOME ICHIRO.”
Many of them know only what the numbers can tell them, the list of achievements that made him worth tens of millions. Seven straight batting titles and a lifetime .353 average. Some may have gone down to spring training, gathering in the Arizona heat, and seen it for themselves: 26 hits, catching batting practice fly balls behind his back, throwing runners out at third with seemingly effortless throws from deep right. The speed — the Mariners said they’d clocked his home-to-first time at 3.7 seconds. (The fastest average home-to-first time among major leaguers in 2018 was 3.86.) Read the rest of this entry »
Even if you didn’t wake up at an ungodly early hour to watch Thursday’s Mariners-A’s game at the Tokyo Dome, by now you may have seen the stirring footage of Ichiro Suzuki exiting the game in the eighth inning en route to his official retirement. If not, beware the coming dust storm:
That the 45-year-old Suzuki — who was nudged off the Mariners’ roster and into an unofficial retirement and special assistant role last May 3, at a point when he was hitting .205/.255/.205 through 47 plate appearances — went 0-for-5 with a walk and a strikeout in his two-game cameo matters not a whit as far as his legacy is concerned. His awe-inspiring total of 4,367 career hits (1,278 in Nippon Professional Baseball, 3,089 in Major League Baseball) still stands as the signature accomplishment for a player who has spent more than a quarter-century serving as a wonderful ambassador for the sport on two continents. His stateside resumé, which includes not only his membership in the 3,000 Hit Club (despite not debuting in the majors until he was about half past his 27th birthday) but also his 10 All-Star appearances, 10 Gold Gloves, AL MVP and Rookie of the Year awards, and so on, is ample enough to guarantee him first-ballot election to the Hall of Fame. In the wake of Mariano Rivera’s groundbreaking unanimous election to the Hall in January, it’s even possible that Ichiro could replicate the feat.
The question is when. Hall of Fame election rules require a player to be retired for five seasons before appearing on the BBWAA ballot, which means that had he been content to hang up his spikes last May, he would have been eligible for the 2024 ballot (the date refers to the year of induction, not the year of the ballot’s release, which is typically in late November or early December of the previous year). Barring what would be an unprecedented ruling by the Hall, his two-game cameo resets his eligibility clock, pushing him to the 2025 ballot, a small price to pay for his being able to check off the bucket-list item of retiring on his own terms, in his native country. Not only will he become the first Japanese player to be elected to the Hall, but according to the Baseball-Reference Play Index, he will be the owner of the shortest final season of any elected position player. Read the rest of this entry »
Update: Following Seager’s surgery, it appears that he will now miss 10-12 weeks, rather than the six weeks or so estimated at the time this article was written. Please update your misery accordingly.
Last Friday, Kyle Seager dove for a ball that was smacked down the third-base line by the Cubs’ Javy Báez and hurt his hand in the process. Scott Servais removed Seager from the game during a subsequent pitching change, and the Mariners announced Monday that the third baseman would undergo immediate surgery to repair an extensor tendon in his left hand. I am not intimately familiar with extensor tendons as a matter of course, but I understand they’re what allow you to straighten your fingers and thumbs. Since you need to be able to do those things in order to play baseball, Seager will be out six weeks.
Because the Mariners aren’t expected to be very good this year — their 75-87 projection is better only than the Rangers’ in their division — this isn’t the kind of injury that you’d expect to materially affect the way the season plays out for Seattle, but it is kind of a bummer for Seager, who had a pretty bad year last year and could use a bounceback. Here are Seager’s numbers for 2011-2017 and 2018, respectively:
Kyle Seager’s Bad Year
Seasons
PA
AVG
OBP
ISO
K%
BB%
wOBA
wRC+
2011-2017
4,213
.263
.332
.184
16.7%
8.5%
.337
117
2018
630
.221
.273
.178
21.9%
6.0%
.288
84
There’s a reasonable argument to be made that some of Seager’s under-performance last year was due to an unusually low BABIP (.251, compared to a career mark of .281), and that .178 ISO isn’t too far off his career mark of .183, but it’s hard to write off the sudden spike in strikeout rate — Seager posted a 14.3% full-season mark as recently as 2015 — especially when it comes, as it does, alongside a three-year slide in contact rate, from 83.4% in that 2015 season to 78.8% last year. Last year, for the first time in his career, Seager had a negative run value on fastballs (-0.69 per hundred seen). Something, clearly, was a little off. Read the rest of this entry »
We’re just a week away from actual major league baseball games and two weeks from Opening Day, and the free agent market is about spent. Dallas Keuchel and Craig Kimbrel remain free agents for now, the only two available players projected for two or more WAR on our depth charts. Even lowering the bar to a single win only adds two additional names in Carlos Gonzalez and Gio Gonzalez.
Unless your team is willing to sign Keuchel or Kimbrel, any improvements will have to be made via a trade. And since pretty much every team could use an improvement somewhere, it’s the best time of the year for a bit of fantasy matchmaking until we get to post-All Star Week.
Note that these are not trades I predict will happen, only trades I’d like to see happen for one reason or another. Until I’m appointed Emperor-King of Baseball, I have no power to make these trades happen.
One of the reasons the Kluber trade rumors so persistently involved the Padres this winter is because it made so much sense. The idea was that Cleveland had a deep starting rotation and an offense that looked increasingly like that of the Colorado Rockies, with a couple of MVP candidates and abundant quantities of meh elsewhere.
On the Padres side, the team’s lineup looked nearly playoff-viable in a number of configurations with the exception of a hole at third base. The team was awash in pitching prospects but had a drought of 2019 rotation-ready candidates.
These facts have largely stayed unchanged with the obvious exception of San Diego’s hole at third base. The Padres aren’t far away from contending, and while signing Keuchel is cleaner, revisiting Kluber is a bigger gain.
At four years and $28 million guaranteed after the trade’s cash subsidy, Myers actually has some value to the Indians, who have resorted to fairly extreme measures like seriously considering Hanley Ramirez for a starting job. Most contenders aren’t upgraded by a league-average outfielder/DH, but the Indians would be. Cleveland can’t let Kluber get away without taking a top 50ish prospect, and Naylor is a lot more interesting on a team like the Indians, which has a lot of holes on the easy side of the defensive spectrum, than he is on one that wants to be in the Eric Hosmer business for a decade.
Unfortunately, in the end, I expect that Cleveland wasn’t as serious about trading Kluber as they were made out to be and would likely be far more interested in someone who could contribute now, like Chris Paddack. And Paddack makes the trade make a lot less sense for the Padres, given that they have enough holes in the rotation that they ought to want Kluber and Paddack starting right now.
The relationship between Castellanos and the Tigers seems to oscillate between the former wanting a trade and both sides wanting to hammer out a contract extension.
Truth is, trading Castellanos always made more sense as the Tigers really aren’t that close to being a competitive team yet, even in the drab AL Central. Castellanos is not a J.D. Martinez-type hitter, and I feel Detroit would be making a mistake if lingering disappointment from a weak return for Martinez were to result in them not getting value for Castellanos.
While one could envision a future Indian infield where Jose Ramirez ends up back at second, and Chang is at third (or second), I think the need for a hitter, even if the first trade proposed here were to happen, is too great. Oviedo is years away and Cleveland’s window of contention can’t wait to see if Bradley turns things around.
I suspect that if the Mets were willing to sign Dallas Keuchel, he’d already be in Queens. In an offseason during which the Mets lit up the neon WIN NOW sign, they’ve confusingly kept the fifth starter seat open for Jason Vargas for no particular reason.
Rather than wait for Vargas to rediscover the blood magicks that allowed him to put on a Greg Maddux glamour for a few months a couple of years ago, I’d much rather the Mets use their fifth starter role in a more interesting way. Bundy has largely disappointed, but there’s likely at least some upside left that the Orioles have shown little ability to figure out yet.
Toffey would struggle to get at-bats in New York unless the team’s plethora of third-base-capable players came down with bubonic plague, and given that the team isn’t interested in letting Lockett seriously challenge Vargas’ role, better to let him discover how to get lefties out on a team that’s going to lose 100 games.
Boston’s bullpen was a solid group in 2018, finishing fifth in FIP and ninth in bullpen WAR. But it’s a group that is now missing Kimbrel and Joe Kelly, two relievers who combined for 2.2 of the team’s 4.9 WAR. The Red Sox haven’t replaced that lost production, and while they talk about how they really think that Ryan Brasier is great, they already had him last year. Now he’ll throw more innings in 2019, but that will largely be balanced by him not actually being a 1.60 ERA pitcher.
The Red Sox have dropped to 22nd in the depth chart rankings for bullpens, and although ZiPS is more optimistic than the ZiPS/Steamer mix, it’s only by enough to get Boston to 18th.
The Orioles are one of the few teams who might possibly be willing to part with bullpen depth at this point in the season and Givens, three years from free agency, gives the Red Sox the extra arm they need. Mata is a fascinating player, but he’s erratic and Boston needs to have a little more urgency in their approach. The O’s have more time to sort through fascinatingly erratic pitchers like Mata and Tanner Scott.
You know that point at a party when the momentum has kinda ended and people have slowly begun filtering to their cars or Ubers, but there’s one heavily inebriated dude who has decided he’s the King of New Years, something he proclaims in cringe-worthy fashion to the dwindling number of attendees?
That’s the Giants.
The party is over in San Francisco, with the roster not improved in any meaningful way from the ones that won 64 and 73 games in each of the last two seasons. The Giants are probably less likely to win 90 games than George R. R. Martin is to finish The Winds of Winter before the end of the final season of Game of Thrones.
You can’t trade Bumgarner expecting the return you would for 2016-level Bumgarner, but you can get value from a team that could use a boost in a very competitive National League.
An innings-eater doesn’t have great value for the Mariners, who are unlikely to be very October-relevant. The Reds seem like they’ll happily volunteer to pick up the money to keep from trading a better prospect; they can’t put all their eggs into the 2019 basket.
With Alex Wood having back issues, a Leake reunion feels like a good match to me, and with Stephenson out of options, he’d get more time to hit his upside in Seattle than he would with a Reds team that really wants to compete this year.
Washington keeps trading away highly interesting-yet-erratic relievers midseason in a scramble to find relief pitching. Why not acquire one of those guys for a change and see what happens? Stop being the team that ships out Felipe Vazquezes or Blake Treinens and be the team that finds and keeps them instead.
The Giants have a bit of a bullpen logjam and realistically, a reliever who can’t help them right now isn’t worth a great deal; relief is a high-leverage role and by the time Adon is ready, the Giants will likely be a poor enough team that it won’t matter. They may already be! Antuna gives them a lottery pick for a player who could help the team someday in a more meaningful way.
Ben Lindbergh and Sam Miller banter about Max Scherzer’s supremacy and the changes coming to the Atlantic League in 2019 as part of its partnership with MLB, include an altered base size, mound distance, strike zone, and more, then preview the 2019 Nationals (29:00) with Washington Post columnist Barry Svrluga, and the 2019 Seattle Mariners (1:04:16) with Seattle Times Mariners beat writer Ryan Divish.
Below is an analysis of the prospects in the farm system of the Seattle Mariners. Scouting reports are compiled with information provided by industry sources as well as from our own (both Eric Longenhagen’s and Kiley McDaniel’s) observations. For more information on the 20-80 scouting scale by which all of our prospect content is governed you can click here. For further explanation of the merits and drawbacks of Future Value, read this.
All of the numbered prospects here also appear on The Board, a new feature at the site that offers sortable scouting information for every organization. That can be found here.
Drafted: 1st Round, 2014 from Tullahoma HS (TN) (CLE)
Age
22.8
Height
5′ 10″
Weight
195
Bat / Thr
L / L
FV
50
Tool Grades (Present/Future)
Fastball
Slider
Changeup
Command
Sits/Tops
55/55
55/60
50/55
45/50
91-96 / 97
Sheffield has now been traded twice: once from Cleveland to New York for Andrew Miller, and then from New York to Seattle for James Paxton. Except for his 2017 Fall League excursion, during which Sheffield had the best stretch of command he’s ever had, he’s had issues throwing strikes. This, combined with some injuries (an oblique strain in 2017, shoulder stiffness in 2018) and the way Sheffield’s body has thickened, has led some scouts to conclude that Sheffield will eventually be a reliever, albeit a very good one due to the quality of his stuff. We don’t think his fastball is going to miss as many bats as you might expect given its velocity. It’s a mid-90s bowling ball sinker with well-below average spin rate. This should pair well with Sheffield’s changeup, but it may not effectively set up his slider, which on its own is excellent. He’s more likely to end up a league-average starter than a middle or top of the rotation type, and he might be a dynamic, multi-inning reliever.
One could argue the 27-year-old Kickuchi doesn’t belong on a prospects list, but he’s not even the oldest player on The Board, and you’d probably like to know more about him, so here we go. MLB teams had interest in Kikuchi when he was a teenager and several of them courted him before he was drafted into NPB. Though minor ailments limited his early-career workload, he’s been one of the better starters in Japan for the last six years and has been especially good for the last two, before Saitama posted him. He started getting into pitch design after his parent club installed a TrackMan unit in 2016.
Like a lot of Japanese pitchers, Kikuchi has a kitchen sink repertoire that features a splitter and various breaking balls. Everything is above-average, except for Kikuchi’s fastball. Mechanically, Kikuchi is similar to MacKenzie Gore, although his stride direction is more direct to the plate and his delivery has a brief intermission as his landing leg descends (pause) then everything comes home. His arm action is efficient and Kikuchi’s slot is vertical, something it seems that more analytically inclined teams prefer. He sounds like a mid-rotation starter who, for our purposes, will enter his decline phase earlier than everyone else on this list because of his age.
Drafted: 1st Round, 2018 from Waukesha West HS (WI) (NYM)
Age
19.6
Height
6′ 1″
Weight
196
Bat / Thr
L / L
FV
50
Tool Grades (Present/Future)
Hit
Raw Power
Game Power
Run
Fielding
Throw
25/60
55/55
20/50
55/50
45/50
60/60
Kelenic was one of four prep hitters in the 2018 class — along with Brice Turang, Alek Thomas, and Mike Siani — who played together in the Team USA pipeline for years; all got top-two round money in the draft. Kelenic is the best of the group because he offers the best contact skills while also being tied for having the most raw power, speed, and defensive value. His well-rounded skillset enticed the Mets to take him sixth overall, but he was then traded by new GM Brodie Van Wagnen as the headliner to acquire Robinson Cano and Edwin Diaz. Kelenic is an intense competitor who works tirelessly, to the point that some teammates and scouts think he should reel it back in a bit at times, though they point out they’d rather have a guy who’s too dedicated than one who’s not enough. He’s a plus straight-line runner but more of a 55 on the field, and thus isn’t a slam dunk to stick in center. But he has 55 raw power, so there’s enough thump to profile if he ends up sliding over to right field, where his plus arm would also fit.
Drafted: 1st Round, 2016 from Boston College (NYM)
Age
23.5
Height
6′ 2″
Weight
210
Bat / Thr
R / R
FV
50
Tool Grades (Present/Future)
Fastball
Slider
Curveball
Changeup
Command
Sits/Tops
55/55
55/60
45/50
50/55
45/50
92-95 / 97
A college reliever until midway through his junior year at Boston College, Dunn’s repertoire has developed quickly and he now has four above-average pitches. Both of his breaking balls (a slider in the mid-80s and an upper-70s curve) work because he has terrific command of both, almost always locating them down and to his glove side in places that are enticing but unhittable. This wanes when he’s pitching from the stretch. His fastball command is below average but he throws hard enough to get away with mistakes, sitting 92-95 and touching 97. His changeup came on late in the year and will flash plus. It’s firm, 85-88mph, but some of them have a lot of arm side movement and will still miss bats. Dunn finished 2018 at Double-A and has a shot to debut next year, but more likely sees Safeco in 2020.
We now have a full season of data to help us figure out whether Evan White’s weird profile is going to play. A plus-running, backwards guy (he bats right and throws left, a generally unfavorable combination due to the defensive limitations and platoon issues caused by both) who plays plus defense at first base, White was slugging .391 at the start of August, which is rather uninspiring for a college hitter in the Cal League. By the end of the month, however, White had 30 hits in 90 plate appearances and was slugging .763.
He has made subtle changes to his lower half, drawing his front knee back toward his rear hip more than he did at Kentucky, and taking a longer stride back toward the pitcher. White is more often finishing with a flexed front leg, which has helped him go down and lift balls in the bottom part of the strike zone by adjusting his lower half instead of his hands. White looked good during the Arizona Fall League, too, squelching some concern that he was just a polished college hitter beating up on Cal League pitching. He’s one of the more bizarre players in the minors.
Drafted: 12th Round, 2013 from Jacksonville HS (AL) (CIN)
Age
23.5
Height
5′ 8″
Weight
180
Bat / Thr
L / R
FV
50
Tool Grades (Present/Future)
Hit
Raw Power
Game Power
Run
Fielding
Throw
40/45
55/55
40/50
55/55
40/45
50/50
After a bad 42-game initial foray into Double-A in 2017, Long’s BABIP and overall statline rebounded in his 2018 full season campaign at Pensacola, where he hit .261/.353/.412 with 12 homers and 19 steals. A converted catcher, with rare straight-line speed for a backstop but the stereotypically excellent catcher makeup, Long is still not a very good second baseman and has below average hands and clunky footwork. He has now been playing there regularly for three and a half seasons, and his development has plateaued. We still have him projected as a 45 defender at second base but also think there’s an increased chance that he eventually moves to the outfield. It would be much easier for Long to profile were he to stay at second base, where big leaguers slashed a collective .254/.317/.395 (good for a 93 wRC+) in 2018. The outfield corners are not so kind. Ultimately, Long has some power and his thunderous uppercut swing is going to enable him to get to it in games, even if his contact profile is fringy. That will play everyday at second base so long as he can. Since acquiring him, the Mariners have used Shed at second, third, and in left field. He’s looked pretty good at third for not having played there and he’s hit well in big league spring training games.
Signed: July 2nd Period, 2017 from Dominican Republic (SEA)
Age
18.2
Height
6′ 3″
Weight
205
Bat / Thr
R / R
FV
45+
Tool Grades (Present/Future)
Hit
Raw Power
Game Power
Run
Fielding
Throw
25/55
55/65
30/60
45/40
40/50
55/60
It isn’t often that people in baseball begin recounting their thoughts on a player as talented as Rodriguez with fawning anecdotes about the player’s maturity, but that is almost always what happens when scouts talk about Julio. He is an old, reflective soul with an adolescent’s enthusiasm for baseball in the body of a Division I tight end. Because Rodriguez spent his 2018 summer in the DSL (which isn’t heavily scouted) and Seattle eschews game action during instructional league, if people in baseball wanted a look at Rodriguez they sought out the highlight clips he would upload to his Instagram account. He hit .315/.404/.525 in the DSL, so there were plenty of those. His feed is also full of group photos with other young prospects and several big leaguers, all of whom Rodriguez is taller than.
The convergence of his physical, technical, and seeming emotional maturity have caused Seattle to publicly consider skipping Rodriguez over the AZL and Northwest League in favor of sending him right to their new Low-A affiliate in Charleston, West Virginia as a young 18-year-old. The cultural assimilation curve may be steep, but Rodriguez is talented enough to have on-field success there. His approach is quiet and would appear contact-oriented if not for his prodigious natural strength, which turns would-be flare singles into gap doubles, and causes mis-hit flyouts to threaten the warning track. He could end up with a plus bat and plus power, plenty to profile in an outfield corner, hit in the middle of a good order, and perhaps be a perennial All-Star. The Kelenic/Rodriguez duo is refined enough that they each might be promoted at a pace that more closely mimics college players than recently-acquired teenagers, which would enable them to have more big league overlap with the crop of twenty-somethings the org acquired in the Paxton/Diaz deals.
We don’t typically project such a strong post-draft uptick in velocity for a college starter, but Gilbert was worked so hard during his junior year at Stetson that we believe the velo he showed last year was beneath what we’ll see with a more regimented workload as a pro. He was sitting 92-96 as a rising sophomore on Cape Cod, but often sat 90-94, and sometimes 88-91, throughout his starts the following spring. While we anticipate a rebound — and Gilbert has been 94-97 in bullpens and simulated environments this spring — college starters often experience a slight downturn in velo because they’re being asked to go every fifth day for five months instead of once a week for three and a half. While there’s a wide array of potential outcomes for Gilbert’s fastball, his command, breaking ball quality, prototypical frame, and mechanical consistency have been stable. He at least profiles as a quick-moving backend starter, but could be a mid-rotation arm if the velo comes back, and he’s a good bet to be on our mid-year top 100 update.
We still know less about Lewis than is typical of a 23-year-old prospect, largely due to the significant time he missed because of a 2016 ACL tear suffered just a month after his pro debut. The injury washed away the rest of 2016 and essentially all of 2017, as a visibly hobbled Lewis stopped and started baseball activity several times due to ongoing issues with the knee. He even began 2018 with a month-long stay on the injured list because he wasn’t a full go when spring training began. He was healthy for the rest of 2018 but his performance was mixed, and his tools beneath where they were in college. He was clearly less explosive than most of his peers at the Futures Game were, but of course at that point he had only been playing healthy, regular baseball for about two months.
This spring, the physical ability that had scouts calling Lewis the most talented prospect on Cape Cod — and that drove him to near the top of 2016 draft boards — has returned. That injured right knee looks healthy as it twists and bends through contact. It’s shouldering more of a mechanical burden now than it was in 2017, certainly, and Lewis is taking healthy but comfortable hacks with the same natural flyball loft he exhibited in college. He’s hit a few impressive spring training homers but has also swung through quite a few fastballs in the zone, some in the 90-92 mph range. Teams were concerned about potential strikeout issues in college, concerns that were exacerbated by the small-school competition he faced, which served to limit the confidence teams had in his performance. This year is not only important for Lewis’ development but for the industry’s understanding of his profile. He finally appears healthy and he has heart-of-the order offensive talent so long as he doesn’t have severe contact issues.
Signed: July 2nd Period, 2018 from Dominican Republic (SEA)
Age
17.4
Height
6′ 1″
Weight
180
Bat / Thr
R / R
FV
40+
Tool Grades (Present/Future)
Hit
Raw Power
Game Power
Run
Fielding
Throw
20/50
50/60
20/55
45/40
40/50
45/50
Marte, who signed for $1.5 million last July, was one of the more exciting power hitters in the class. For the second straight year, the Mariners’ top international signee was a strong-bodied prospect more physically mature than the typical teenager. With broad, tapered shoulders and a sizable lower half, he body comps to Jonathan Schoop and like Schoop, he projects to move off of shortstop at some point. His size prohibits projection at the position on its own, and Marte’s hands were also inconsistent as an amateur; some international scouts thought he might move to the outfield.
But Marte has the thunderous, pull-side power to profile just about anywhere, especially if he can stay on the dirt. He should end up with plus raw power at peak, perhaps more. He has a long, slow leg kick that doesn’t add much to his swing efficacy right now, as most of Marte’s power comes from pure hand speed and strength, but that will likely improve with reps. He’s a volatile, exciting young prospect who may be on the Julio Rodriguez development track, which would mean we likely won’t see him play much in the U.S. until 2020.
Raleigh switched his college commitment from Clemson to Florida State late when the Clemson head coach was fired after the season, freeing up signees to move. One other Clemson signee, current Royals right-handed pitcher Jackson Kowar, switched to Florida and cost the Tigers two solid three-year contributors. Raleigh had a big bonus number out of high school and was well-rounded, but had enough questions that clubs didn’t feel comfortable going well past the $1 million mark.
At Florida State, he developed skills that work best in today’s game: he’s not seen as a lock to stick at a catcher but has above average arm strength to work with and is a plus framer according to some clubs’ metrics. He’s seen as a below average hit, above average power type at the plate and with the sorry state of big league catching, that adds up to a regular if things continue developing in this way. We’ve heard of at least two other clubs that attempted to get Raleigh to their pick in the draft for an overslot bonus when Seattle stepped in and ruined those plans — the best way to confirm that a player has industry trade value — so we’ve moved him up just a bit since our draft day 40 FV grade.
Drafted: 8th Round, 2014 from Iowa Western JC (IA) (TEX)
Age
25.5
Height
6′ 3″
Weight
235
Bat / Thr
R / R
FV
40+
Tool Grades (Present/Future)
Fastball
Slider
Changeup
Command
Sits/Tops
60/60
45/50
45/50
50/55
91-95 / 96
Swanson’s fastball exhibits several of the nuanced traits that aid velocity in missing bats. For one, his heater has a 12:30 spin axis, which means it has nearly perfect backspin, better enabling fastball rise. It also has an approach angle that plays well at the top of the strike zone, which, in combination with the rise and velocity, makes it the archetypal modern fastball. His secondary stuff is quite average but as long as he is locating his mid-80s slider and changeup — something he has struggled with in his big league appearances this spring — he should at least be a good backend starter or multi-inning reliever, and it’s possible the secondary fastball characteristics are so strong that we’re underselling him a little bit.
Drafted: 2nd Round, 2017 from Burnsville HS (MN) (SEA)
Age
20.3
Height
6′ 4″
Weight
195
Bat / Thr
R / R
FV
40+
Tool Grades (Present/Future)
Fastball
Curveball
Changeup
Command
Sits/Tops
55/60
45/50
50/60
40/55
89-93 / 94
Carlson has thrown just three pro innings since signing, as the minor flexor strain that shelved him after his draft turned out to be a prelude to surgery. He was given a PRP injection in an attempt to avoid Tommy John, but it was unsuccessful and he went under the knife in early July of 2018. The timing of the surgery may keep Carlson out for all of 2019. When he finally returns, he’ll be a 21-year-old with less developmental polish than a lot of teenage prospects from year-round baseball areas like Florida and Texas, as a former a two-way, cold-weather high schooler who will have missed about 30 consecutive months of reps.
The summer before his senior year, Carlson was 88-92 with better command and changeup feel than is typical for a northern prep arm. His velocity ticked up the following spring and he was touching 96, then sat 92-95 in his few pro innings before his injury. If his stuff comes back, he has No. 4 starter upside.
Bishop’s 2018 season ended in July when he was hit by a pitch and suffered a fractured forearm. Though he has made swing tweaks that have dropped his groundball rate from a whopping 60% to 48% (which is still greater than league average), he is unlikely to do much offensive damage, and probably not enough to profile as an average everyday player. But he can really go get it in center field, and could turn into a Kevin Pillar type of regular who ends up playing every day simply because of how good he is in the field. A plus-plus runner with expansive range at the position, Bishop is capable of turning would-be extra-base hits into outs, and his speed and instincts on the basepaths will make him a dynamic pinch running option if he ends up in a bench outfield role, which most teams believe to be his median outcome. He’ll likely spend most of 2019 in Tacoma but could be up in September.
Mills has several traits that are atypical not only of side-arm relievers, but of relievers in general. For one, he throws harder than most side-armers and will have outings where he sits comfortably in the 93-95 range with his fastball, while dropping down into the 91-94 range in others. He also throws an unusually high ratio of strikes for a bullpen arm; 70% of his 2018 fastballs went for strikes. In addition to his dastardly slider, Mills also has a pretty good changeup, which helps to mitigate platoon issues that might otherwise be worse given his arm slot. In our estimation, the strike-throwing and changeup give Mills a better chance of playing a high-leverage or multi-inning role than the other relief-only prospects in this system. A caveat here is that Mills did not throw on back-to-back days in 2018 and often had several days of rest between appearances, so we’re not sure how his stuff might respond to the more varied usage necessitated by the big league environment.
Fraley went 77th overall in 2016, in the comp round after the second round. That’s right around the range in the draft where the college hitters come with some warts and project more as role players than potential regulars. Fraley was a plus runner who projected in center field as an amateur but he has lost a step in pro ball and profiles as more of a tweener now, with offensive skills that don’t overwhelm, so the outcome is most likely bench outfielder of some stripe. There’s a shot he can stay healthy, add some loft to his swing, maintain some contact skills, and end up as a Ben Gamel-esque soft 50 FV for a couple seasons, but he’s more likely to fall in the Jake Cave or Billy McKinney region where a swing change ensures a big league role.
Seattle acquired Fraley from the Rays, their best friend from trade camp, in the Mike Zunino/Mallex Smith swap this winter. Needs lined up, as Seattle was looking for cheap potential MLB contributors in the next season or two, and Tampa has a never-ending 40-man crunch to manage.
Drafted: 5th Round, 2016 from South Carolina (NYY)
Age
23.9
Height
6′ 0″
Weight
190
Bat / Thr
L / L
FV
40
Tool Grades (Present/Future)
Hit
Raw Power
Game Power
Run
Fielding
Throw
30/40
50/50
35/50
55/55
50/55
50/50
In addition to his high school baseball stardom, Thompson-Williams was a good wide receiver and safety in Sioux City, Iowa. It’s rare that an athlete like this gets to college at all, let alone a junior college, but DTW spent the first two years of his college career at Iowa Western JC, then transferred to South Carolina, where he answered any lingering questions about whether he could translate his raw athleticism into on-field performance against pro-level competition.
He had a breakout 20/20 season at Hi-A last year, albeit as a 23-year-old. He has big raw power but there are questions about how readily he’ll be able to get to it in games, and teams have varying opinions about whether or not he can stay in center field. There’s low-end everyday upside if things continue to come together at the plate the way they did in 2018. More likely, Thompson-Williams is a useful platoon at multiple outfield spots, or as a player who can provide some thump and speed off the bench. Given his shorter track record and age, that’s a 40 FV for now with a chance to turn into a 45 FV with upper-level performance, which would reinforce notions that his 2018 on-paper production was real.
Signed: July 2nd Period, 2017 from Venezuela (SEA)
Age
18.5
Height
6′ 2″
Weight
175
Bat / Thr
R / R
FV
40
Tool Grades (Present/Future)
Hit
Raw Power
Game Power
Run
Fielding
Throw
20/55
40/45
20/40
45/50
45/50
55/60
Querecuto suffered a torn meniscus in February, but his physical immaturity almost certainly had him ticketed for the AZL, so while he may be brought along slowly as minor league spring training gets underway, he should be fine for game action during extended spring training, and when rookie ball starts in June. He’s a graceful but unexplosive shortstop, with a limber, projectable frame. His arm and body control are clean fits at short, though his first step leaves a bit to be desired. He may grow into some power as his body matures, which may enable him to play every day, but it’s more likely that he becomes a utility type.
Signed: July 2nd Period, 2012 from Dominican Republic (BOS)
Age
23.8
Height
6′ 4″
Weight
195
Bat / Thr
R / R
FV
40
Tool Grades (Present/Future)
Fastball
Slider
Changeup
Command
Sits/Tops
70/70
50/50
45/45
40/40
92-97 / 99
Bautista was part of Seattle’s return in the Diaz/Cano trade (the Mets acquired him from Boston for Addison Reed at the 2017 trade deadline). He’s an arm strength-dependent reliever who’ll likely lose list eligibility sometime this season. He throws really hard and has been in the 96-97 mph range in his big league outings this spring while showing a slightly improved slider. It doesn’t move much, but it moves quite a bit considering how hard it is, sitting in the 86-87 mph range this spring. It has mostly horizontal action when Bautista is locating it to his glove side but has more vertical action to it when it’s closer to the middle of the plate. The secondary stuff for high-leverage duty probably isn’t here, and we have Bautista projected as a middle reliever.
Drafted: 7th Round, 2016 from East Stroudsburg (SEA)
Age
26.0
Height
6′ 2″
Weight
195
Bat / Thr
R / R
FV
40
Tool Grades (Present/Future)
Fastball
Slider
Curveball
Command
Sits/Tops
50/50
55/55
50/50
45/50
92-94 / 96
The movement profiles on Festa’s four and two-seam fastballs are sufficiently different that he’s one of the few prospects for whom we wish we had separate columns on The Board for each fastball classification. It’s imperative that Festa not only vary the shape of his fastball but that he work with his slider often because for a reliever, he doesn’t throw especially hard. His repertoire depth is a significant part of why he’s likely to be successful in the big leagues. Both his heavily-used slider and curveball are of big league quality and can miss bats when located, and Festa has a serviceable changeup. He’ll probably be the first East Stroudsburg University alum to log significant big league time in over a century and will likely graduate off this list in 2019.
Gerber was 104th in our pre-draft rankings, and Seattle ended up popping him in the eighth round, 238th overall, in what looked immediately like a great value for a slipped-through-the-cracks prospect. Gerber was widely scouted, but clubs often start saving money by taking seniors around the fifth round, lining up 11th round picks to spend their savings on and scooping up the last signable prep prospects, or generally looking for upside and/or low cost players. In those situations, potential middle relievers who sign for about slot can sometimes be overlooked, although the 2017 version was Pirates seventh rounder Jared Oliva, a tools-over-performance corner outfielder, another demographic clubs are hesitant to take in the 5th-8th rounds. Gerber sits 92-95 and hits 96 mph with above average life, and mixes in an above average slider, a changeup that flashes average, and a combination of tempo and deception that keeps hitters off balance. He’s probably not a setup man or a closer but he’s not that different than Giants third rounder Jake Wong, who signed for $850,000, while Gerber went five rounds later and signed for $167,400, and may move even faster through the system. These are the kind of small edges a rebuilding system needs to grab when they’re available.
Drafted: 18th Round, 2015 from Michigan State (SEA)
Age
24.3
Height
6′ 1″
Weight
190
Bat / Thr
R / L
FV
40
Tool Grades (Present/Future)
Fastball
Slider
Curveball
Changeup
Command
Sits/Tops
45/45
50/55
55/60
45/45
45/50
91-94 / 95
Part of the growing support group of players who have been traded and then reacquired by Jerry Dipoto, Misiewicz made just five starts for the Rays before they shipped him back to Seattle after the 2017 season. He’s an athletic lefty with a bevy of average or better pitches that should enable him to operate as a fifth starter or multi-inning reliever. Though his fastball plays up a little bit due to extension and occasionally has bat-missing movement, it’s fairly hittable when left in the strike zone and Misiewicz will likely have to make frequent use of his changeup and breaking ball. It’s unclear if he has two separate breaking balls or if Misiewicz is simply adept at subtle speed/shape manipulation of the same pitch, but the utility of each version is different enough that we have it graded as two different pitches. Regardless, there’s sufficient fifth starter stuff here, especially if there’s a way to alter his fastball shape and usage in a way that makes it less vulnerable in the strike zone.
Drafted: 9th Round, 2017 from Leadership Christian HS (PR) (SEA)
Age
19.8
Height
6′ 2″
Weight
155
Bat / Thr
L / L
FV
35+
A good get for $150,000 in the ninth round of his draft, Benitez is a slightly atypical teenage projection arm with feel for spin. Similar to the way Triston McKenzie was viewed by a minority of teams, some clubs thought Benitez’s measurables were misleading as to his projectability and that his frame was so slight that there was nowhere to put extra mass. So far Benitez’s fastball is up a little bit from high school but still south of the average big league heater, and we now have quantifiable verification that he can spin his breaking ball well (about 2500 rpm on average). If the velocity suddenly pops, he’ll shoot up past the relief-only types on this list as Benitez will have a better chance of starting.
Signed: July 2nd Period, 2013 from Dominican Republic (SEA)
Age
23.2
Height
6′ 1″
Weight
175
Bat / Thr
L / L
FV
35+
Though he posted the lowest strikeout rate of his career in 2018 amid a minor swing change, Liberato still did not perform in a semi-repeat of Hi-A. His stance has closed off but there’s still a lot of noise in his hands and he only does damage on balls down and in; there’s a lot of work to be done if Liberato is going to hit enough to play everyday, despite his physical talent. He still has bench outfielder tools. There’s some pull-side power here, a plus arm, and the speed to play center when Liberato is healthy, which he really wasn’t last year. He was left back in extended spring training until late May with hamstring soreness and saw more time in left field than in center for the first time in his career. Never an efficient base stealer, Liberato was successful in just two of his seven attempts and didn’t even try to swipe a bag after June. He was running better in the Dominican Winter League and we still like his chances of bouncing back and finding his way onto a big league bench, though there are now several other left-handed hitting outfielders ahead of him in this system.
Signed: July 2nd Period, 2013 from Venezuela (LAA)
Age
21.9
Height
5′ 11″
Weight
215
Bat / Thr
L / L
FV
35+
21-year-old lefties who can spin a breaking ball don’t often end up in DFA limbo, but the Braves glut of talented young pitchers forced the developmentally stagnant Sanchez off the 40-man this past winter. He has been pretty much the same pitcher since he was 19-years-old, possessing enviable stuff but never the mechanical consistency to harness it. Sanchez has had a low-90s fastball (that will touch as high as 95 early in outings) and good lefty curveball since before Anaheim sent him to Atlanta for Kyle Kubitza back in 2015, and that combination drives a perfectly fine lefty relief profile, especially if Sanchez can air it out for an inning at a time and adds a few ticks to his fastball as a result. He’s only 22 and will have ample opportunity to make relevant tweaks and adjustments against big league hitters on a quickly rebuilding Seattle club.
Other Prospects of Note
Grouped by type and listed in order of preference within each category.
We’ve never been huge on Rizzo despite his obvious feel for contact because his frame has been maxed out since high school and we weren’t sure where sufficient power was going to come from, especially if he were to ever move off of third base. He’s still just 20 and had respectable peripherals at Hi-A last year, so we’ll continue to keep tabs on him despite our skepticism. Vogelbach and Curletta might each see big league time this year. Vogelbach’s approach prioritizes contact over the type of selectivity he’d need to have to get to all his power. His bat control makes this approach viable, but it may not generate offense that clears the bar at 1B/DH. He may be a good buy low target for an NL team trying to get ahead of the universal DH implementation. Like a lot of Dodgers and ex-Dodgers, Curletta’s batted ball profile has shifted and become flyball heavy over the course of several years. He did have 23 dingers last year, though he was a 24-year-old in Double-A and struck out quite a bit. Those two are both younger than Filia, who has raked for his entire college and pro career amid several off-field issues and a trade that fell through due to a medical red flag. He may fall into a late-career Lenny Harris type role if a team has enough defensive flexibility elsewhere on its roster. McGovern was a high-priority senior sign who remade his physique and had a tool uptick. He’s 23 and will need to move quickly. Sandoval has big power and runs well, but the 33% strikeout rate is ominous.
Delaplane has a 2700 rpm curveball and low-90s sinker, and he hides the ball pretty well and K’d 100 hitters in 60 innings at Low-A last year. Because he’s a cold-weather college arm, it’s a little more acceptable that he performed that way at 23, and we think he’s an interesting sleeper who might get pushed quickly this year. Florido will be 18 all year. He sits 87-89, has modest physical projection, advanced fastball control, and feel for spin. McKay was part of a group of minor league players the Mariners acquired from the Royals for cash early in 2018, presumably for minor league depth reasons. Seattle ‘penned him, and it turns out McKay is actually a decent fastball/slider middle relief prospect. Perez is an 18-year-old pitchability lefty who threw well in the DSL; his stuff is currently a bunch of 45s and 50s and his arm action is good, but the frame limits projection.
These are all relief or depth types in the age 25-27 range. Seattle gave up Juan Then to acquire Rumbelow from the Yankees and he barely pitched last year due to a nerve issue in his neck. When healthy, he’s 92-95, and touches 97, with an above-average changeup and slider. Warren pared his repertoire down and is now a fastball/slider middle relief prospect of somewhat advanced age. Brennan was the team’s Rule 5 pickup; his report is available here.
System Overview
This list, of course, looks much different than last year’s iteration, which was arguably the saddest list we’ve ever done, the Charlie Brown Christmas tree of prospect lists. Of course, stocking this system with several of the high-profile names now present cost Seattle 2018’s best reliever, a shortstop with a 70 bat, a Dominican icon, an emerging if perhaps unassuming face of the franchise, and Mike Zunino.
Most of the prospects Seattle acquired in return are relatively close to the majors, supporting the front office’s public assertions that this will be a short-term rebuild. Additionally, the two teenagers in the system most likely to be stars (Rodriguez and Kelenic) are quite advanced for their age, and could be on an accelerated developmental path that enables them to overlap for a while in the big leagues with the other 50 FV prospects in the system, even though they are about four or five years older than Kelenic and Rodriguez on average.
There will be prospect entropy — J.P. Crawford, who doesn’t look so great thus far in the spring, is a great example of this. Not all of these guys will end up as good as we and the Mariners currently project them to be, and this system is still pretty thin beyond the names who were brought on this offseason. The structure of the rebuild indicates intelligent design, but chaos and entropy will play their role. Mitch Haniger (who looks like a star), Domingo Santana (who has the talent to be one), and the charismatic Mallex Smith (who may sneakily already be one) will be fun to watch while the kids grow up.
We still don’t know a lot about this org’s player development. The swollen physiques of the Jack Zduriencik era seem to be a thing of the past as the strength and conditioning program has improved, but this group really hasn’t had much talent to mold, let alone enough to draw results-based conclusions about the player dev approach, and the cement is pretty dry on the 50 FV prospects listed above.
How much better is this system now than at the end of the year? It was last by a good bit in Craig’s end-of-season analysis and, while we consider re-working our math, it has currently moved up into the 14-19 range in all of baseball.
Brock Burke was a relatively obscure pitcher in the Tampa Bay Rays organization when I first wrote about him in 2017. He was performing well at the time — a 1.23 ERA through nine starts — but context was a mitigating factor. A blip on most prospect radar, he was facing Midwest League hitters in his third full professional season.
He’s no longer quite so obscure. Nor is he Tampa Bay property. In December, the Texas Rangers acquired the 22-year-old southpaw in the three-team trade that sent former top prospect Jurickson Profar to Oakland. His appeal to the AL West cellar dwellers was understandable. Burke fashioned a 1.95 ERA, and fanned 71 batters in 55-and-a-third innings, after earning a second-half promotion to Double-A Montgomery.
I recently asked Texas GM Jon Daniels about the deal that brought Burke to the Lone Star State.
“We’ve had a lot of conversations about Profar over the years,” Daniels told me. “This winter, after a number of talks, we defined what we were looking for. Our priority was to get a young starter who was at the upper levels, and [Burke’s] had a lot of things we liked. His trajectory is really interesting — from Colorado, not a ton of development at a young age. Sometimes guys from those cold-weather states need a little time to lay a foundation.”
Daniels brought up Tyler Phillips — “He really burst onto the scene with us last year” — as another close-to-home example. A 21-year-old right-hander from New Jersey, Phillips emerged as one of the Rangers’ better pitching prospects with a stellar season in the South Atlantic League.
When publishing our lists — in particular, the top 100 — we’re frequently asked who, among the players excluded from this year’s version, might have the best chance of appearing on next year’s version. Whose stock are we buying? This post represents our best attempt to answer all of those questions at once.
This is the second year that we’re doing this, and we have some new rules. First, none of the players you see below will have ever been a 50 FV or better in any of our write-ups or rankings. So while we think Austin Hays might have a bounce back year and be a 50 FV again, we’re not allowed to include him here; you already know about him. We also forbid ourselves from using players who were on last year’s inaugural list. (We were right about 18 of the 63 players last year, a 29% hit rate, though we have no idea if that’s good or not, as it was our first time engaging in the exercise.) At the end of the piece, we have a list of potential high-leverage relievers who might debut this year. They’re unlikely to ever be a 50 FV or better because of their role, but they often have a sizable impact on competitive clubs, and readers seemed to like that we had that category last year.
We’ve separated this year’s players into groups or “types” to make it a little more digestible, and to give you some idea of the demographics we think pop-up guys come from, which could help you identify some of your own with THE BOARD. For players who we’ve already covered this offseason, we included a link to the team lists, where you can find a full scouting report. We touch briefly on the rest of the names in this post. Here are our picks to click:
Teenage Pitchers
Torres was young for his draft class, is a plus athlete, throws really hard, and had surprisingly sharp slider command all last summer. White looked excellent in the fall when the Rangers finally allowed their high school draftees to throw. He sat 92-94, and his changeup and breaking ball were both above-average. Pardinho and Woods Richardson are the two advanced guys in this group. Thomas is the most raw but, for a someone who hasn’t been pitching for very long, he’s already come a long way very quickly.
The “This is What They Look Like” Group
If you like big, well-made athletes, this list is for you. Rodriguez was physically mature compared to his DSL peers and also seems like a mature person. The Mariners have indicated they’re going to send him right to Low-A this year. He could be a middle-of-the-order, corner outfield power bat. Luciano was the Giants’ big 2018 July 2 signee. He already has huge raw power and looks better at short than he did as an amateur. Canario has elite bat speed. Adams was signed away from college football but is more instinctive than most two-sport athletes. Most of the stuff he needs to work on is related to getting to his power.
Advanced Young Bats with Defensive Value
This is the group that produces the likes of Vidal Brujan and Luis Urias. Edwards is a high-effort gamer with 70 speed and feel for line drive contact. Marcano isn’t as stocky and strong as X, but he too has innate feel for contact, and could be a plus middle infield defender. Perez has great all-fields contact ability and might be on an Andres Gimenez-style fast track, where he reaches Double-A at age 19 or 20. Ruiz is the worst defender on this list, but he has all-fields raw power and feel for contact. He draws Alfonso Soriano comps. Palacios is the only college prospect listed here. He had three times as many walks as strikeouts at Towson last year. Rosario controls the zone well, is fast, and is a plus defender in center field.
Corner Power Bats
Nevin will probably end up as a contact-over-power first baseman, but he might also end up with a 70 bat. He looked great against Fall League pitching despite having played very little as a pro due to injury. Lavigne had a lot of pre-draft helium and kept hitting after he signed. He has all-fields power. Apostel saw reps at first during instructs but has a good shot to stay at third. He has excellent timing and explosive hands.
College-aged Pitchers
It’s hard to imagine any of these guys rocketing into the top 50 overall. Rather, we would anticipate that they end up in the 60-100 range on next year’s list. Gilbert was a workhorse at Stetson and his velo may spike with reshaped usage. Singer should move quickly because of how advanced his command is. Lynch’s pre-draft velocity bump held throughout the summer, and he has command of several solid secondaries. Abreu spent several years in rookie ball and then had a breakout 2018, forcing Houston to 40-man him to protect him from the Rule 5. He’ll tie Dustin May for the second-highest breaking ball spin rate on THE BOARD when the Houston list goes up. We’re intrigued by what Dodgers player dev will do with an athlete like Gray. Phillips throws a ton of strikes and has a good four-pitch mix.
Bounce Back Candidates
The Dodgers have a strong track record of taking severely injured college arms who return with better stuff after a long period of inactivity. That could be Grove, their 2018 second rounder, who missed most of his sophomore and junior seasons at West Virginia. McCarthy was also hurt during his junior season and it may have obscured his true abilities. Burger is coming back from multiple Achilles ruptures, but was a strong college performer with power before his tire blew.
Catchers
We’re very excited about the current crop of minor league catchers. Naylor is athletic enough that he’s likely to improve as a defender and he has rare power for the position.
Potentially Dominant Relievers
These names lean “multi-inning” rather than “closer.” Gonsolin was a two-way player in college who has been the beneficiary of sound pitch design. He started last year but was up to 100 mph out of the bullpen the year before. He now throws a four seamer rather than a sinker and he developed a nasty splitter in 2017. He also has two good breaking balls. He has starter stuff but may break in as a reliever this year.
On Thursday, word broke that the Mariners had signed 30-year-old righty Hunter Strickland to a one-year , $1.3 million deal with incentives totaling about the same for games pitched and finished. On Friday afternoon, the Mariners’ division-mates in Oakland announced a deal of their own, for one year and for $4 million, with 35-year-old Marco Estrada. Both pitchers are 2019 bounce-back candidates, and both will spend at least a portion of 2019 in the AL West. Let’s discuss.
Given the terms of his deal, it seems reasonable to assume that the Mariners hope Strickland will be able to step into the ninth-inning role recently vacated by Edwin Díaz, perhaps in concert with Cory Gearren or Anthony Swarzak, or perhaps all by his lonesome, depending on how things shake out in spring training. That kind of uncertainty is the natural consequence of entering 2019 with a bullpen that’s lost Díaz, James Pazos, Juan Nicaso, and Alex Colomé to trade this winter and seems unlikely to welcome free agents Nick Vincent, Zach Duke, and Adam Warren back to Seattle. Seattle had an excellent bullpen in 2018 but doesn’t, in any meaningful sense, have that bullpen any more. Strickland is one of the new guard, here to carry the M’s over the water into the next phase of their rebuild.
Which makes the question of whether Strickland will be any good in 2019 something of an irrelevance to the Mariners’ long-term plans — if he’s good, he can be traded midseason; if he’s bad, it’s “just” $1.3 million — although it presumably remains of considerable importance to Strickland himself. For my money, I’d bet against renewed success in 2019. After routinely sitting in the low triple-digits with his four-fastball during his first three years in the majors (2014-2016), Strickland’s mean velocity on the pitch has dropped to 95.7 miles per hour, and his whiff percentage on the pitch has dropped from its high of 18% in 2015 to 8% last year. Those fundamentals have generated poor results across the board:
Hunter Strickland Had a Bad Year
Year
IP
K%
BB%
ERA
FIP
2014-17
180.2
23.7%
7.9%
2.64
3.15
2018
45.1
18.4%
10.4%
3.97
4.42
It’s hard to know what precisely brought on Strickland’s decline, but given that fastballs don’t usually get faster with age and that Strickland’s particular fastball is already getting beaten up at 95-96 miles per hour, it’s hard to be too sanguine about his future. Then again, given the contract he signed and the Mariners’ current insistence on trading away all their best players, there really is very little downside to this deal for Seattle. Just maybe reinforce the clubhouse doors.
There’s far more reason to be optimistic about the A’s bounce-back candidate, Estrada, despite the fact that his 2018 was if anything even worse than Strickland’s (the 5.64 ERA and 1.82 HR/9 are the figures that jump out at you most immediately). For one thing, Estrada has never really relied on his velocity to generate outs and so last year’s mile-per-hour slide from 90.1 to 89.0 on the fastball isn’t really something to worry about — in fact, it puts him right around where he was in 2016, when he put up a 3.48 ERA over 176 innings for the Blue Jays. For another, Estrada’s game has always been up in the zone and so (a) bad years like 2018 were always going to happen from time to time and (b) you don’t have to wish for too much positive regression on the HR/9 to get him back into a range (say, 2016’s 1.18, or his career 1.41 mark) where you know he can have success.
In Oakland, Estrada will join Mike Fiers, who re-signed with the club in December, and holdovers/questionable starting pitchers Daniel Mengden, Chris Bassitt, and Frankie Montas in an A’s rotation that will be held together by hope and duct tape until Jharel Cotton (Tommy John), A.J. Puk (also Tommy John), and Sean Manaea (shoulder surgery) return to the field at some point mid-season (and maybe Jesús Luzardo comes up at some point). Given the circumstances, and the budget to which the club has decided to hew, Estrada is exactly the kind of guy you’d want to see the A’s sign: healthy (he’s never had an arm injury we know about), inexpensive, and a plausible candidate for solid numbers in 2019. If he’s good in the early going next year, he can slot in at the back end of a rotation that has a reasonable shot at the Wild Card if everything goes right. If he’s terrible, chances are the A’s are too, and — again — it’s just $4 million. Even for the A’s, that’s manageable — their 2018 payroll was $66 million and their commitments for 2019 total just $69 million so far. What could go wrong?
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